After a three-week invite-only beta period, Finnish platform ThisCussion is opening its European discussion platform to everyone with Finnish or Nordic online banking credentials for strong identity verification. The service is helping pave the way for the use of the EUDI Wallet (European Digital Identity Wallet) in social media.
As Arctic15 and ODDfest bring investors, startup founders, creative professionals, and new ideas to Helsinki this week, Finnish company ThisCussion is opening its doors to a wider public audience.
ThisCussion is a new European social media discussion platform whose goal is not to build yet another endless content feed. Its ambition is both simpler and more ambitious: to improve the quality of online conversation.
Behind ThisCussion is a group of Finnish builders of technology, media, and online communities. The company’s owners include IRC-Galleria founder Jari Jaanto, while its advisors include Salla-Maaria Laaksonen from the University of Helsinki and Esa Saarinen and Frank Martela from Aalto University.
For the past three weeks, the service has been operating in an invite-only beta phase with several hundred users. Now, ThisCussion is opening the beta to users with Finnish or Nordic online banking credentials for strong authentication. The login model is designed with the EUDI Login and EU Digital Identity Wallet vision in mind: people know they are talking to real, verified individuals.
“ThisCussion is a great start. Sovereign European social media!” says founder Peter Vesterbacka.
“June is a fantastic time to launch something new in Helsinki. Finest Network is strongly represented as two outstanding events, the investors’ candy store Arctic15 and the vibrant new ODDfest, take over the city together,” Vesterbacka continues.
ThisCussion is built on strong identity verification, topic-based discussion areas, and AI-assisted moderation combined with contextual fact-checking. The platform helps users recognise inappropriate tone before publication, provides context and fact-checking alongside claims, and organises discussions into topic-based ‘Tables’ where conversations progress more clearly than in legacy social media feeds.
“The world does not necessarily need more social media. It desperately needs better conversation. More signal, less noise. Social media for the rest of us,” says ThisCussion founder Juha Palotie.
“Legacy social media has been optimised for attention. We chose to optimise for conversation,” Palotie continues.
ThisCussion was born out of frustration with how most current social media platforms reward visibility, outrage, and reactions more than thoughtfulness, reasoning, and listening. Anonymity, bots, and disposable accounts have changed the tone of online discussion and driven many thoughtful people away from public discourse altogether, even though theirs are the voices that are needed now more than ever.
The core idea behind ThisCussion is simple: strong identity verification does not eliminate disagreement. It makes disagreements the basis for dialogue.
ThisCussion is built around five principles:
Know who you are talking to.
Strong authentication minimises bots and prevents fake accounts and disposable trolling.
Conversation deserves context.
Claims can be accompanied by background information, sources, and fact-checking.
AI helps before the damage is done.
AI-assisted moderation encourages users to reconsider their tone and wording before posting.
Conversation is more than just reactions.
Comments are structured to support reasoning, continuity, and mutual understanding.
A European model for social media.
ThisCussion is built around European values, digital sovereignty, and giving the user actual and intuitive control.
ThisCussion does not view younger users as a lost generation. The TikTok generation has grown up surrounded by fast content, algorithms, and constant competition for attention, but that does not mean young people do not want better conversations. They need spaces where ideas can be exchanged more safely, more intelligently, and more meaningfully.
“This is not about people losing interest in conversation,” says Palotie. “Many have lost interest in the platforms where conversation currently takes place. There is no shortage of content. There is a shortage of meaningful conversation.”
ThisCussion launches from Helsinki but is designed from the outset for all of Europe. The platform has been built for the European digital era: verified identity, AI-era moderation, multilingualism, putting the user in control, and conversation quality are at its core.
